Gravity only dictates how fast we're falling
by Nenia
Summary: All forces occur in pairs... Gordie tries to help Chris understand Newton's laws of gravitation. ChrisGordie, very mild slash


Disclaimer: Chris and Gordie belong to Stephen King, the laws of gravitation are (c) by Isaac Newton. ;)

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**Gravity only dictates how fast we're falling**

**Lex I**

_Corpus omne perseverare in statu suo quiescendi vel movendi uniformiter in directum, nisi quatenus a viribus impressis cogitur statum illum mutare._

"I'm hopeless." He threw down his pencil and pressed his hands to his eyes.

"No, you are not, it just takes some time."

"It takes you ages to make me understand this. Time you should use for reading and studying for yourself."

I could not help the sigh that escaped my lips. "We have been through this. I want to help you, man. So let me do this."

"This is stuff we covered … when, last year? Fuck, how am I supposed to catch up if I take this long to understand even these basic things?"

"Chris." I reached over and pulled the hands from his face. He looked at me, his eyes so red and tired I felt sorry for having to make him study. At times like this, I often wished I could allow him to rest. To sleep and forget for a while how hard he had to struggle every day, facing teachers and kids who mocked him, and every night facing books containing an abundance of knowledge he felt no hope of ever getting into his head. But then I remembered what he had said one night in the woods, when we were camping and the two of us the only ones awake: "I wish I could go someplace where nobody knows me." To leave Castle Rock, to get out of the mill's shadow, he had to be set into motion by an external force, just like the object at rest in Newton's first law. Once set into motion, he'd move on and it would hopefully carry him far away from mean teachers, his abusive father and his bad boy reputation. It was all I could do to give him this impuls. I hoped it would be enough.

"Let's not waste time discussing that you think you can't do this. Let's just try it again, ok?"

He took a deep breath, rubbed his eyes briefly and turned back to the book and his notepad.

**Lex II**

_Mutationem motus proportionalem esse vi motrici impressae, et fieri secundum lineam rectam qua vis illa imprimitur._

"If you draw a line parallel to the first vector, like this," I drew the line, "and one parallel to the second vector, like this," I drew a second line, "and then connect the point that represents the object with where the two lines meet, you get the resulting force."

He stared blankly at the drawing. I was worried he had dozed off with open eyes. "Umh, can you imagine why that is?"

He sighed. "Because the laws of nature have decided to torture me by following rules featuring little arrows?"

I suppressed a smile, stood up and took a step away from the desk.. "Come on, stand up and give me your hands."

He looked confused but did as I asked him to. "If I pull at your right arm in this direction and at your left arm in that direction," he made a step towards me in order not to stumble, "in which direction did your body just move?"

"Towards you?"

"Exactly, because that is the direction of the resulting force. And the length of the arrow, representing that resulting force, tells you how strong it is."

A smile crossed his lips. He still stood very close and it amazed me every time anew how a smile could light up his face, no matter how worn out he was. It was mesmerizing.

"Why couldn't you be my physics teacher of the last two years?"

"I think as your teacher, I could have gotten into trouble for demonstrating Newton's second law on a student."

"Probably. But you would have made physics a hell of a lot more fun than Mr. Nolan did."

"Well, I might become a teacher one day … I dunno." I turned away, suddenly feeling giddy from the proximity. "Here, let me show you how you can calculate - "

A hand on my arm pulled me back around.

**Lex III**

_Actioni contrariam semper et æqualem esse reactionem: sive corporum duorum actiones in se mutuo semper esse æquales et in partes contrarias dirigi._

There are moments of such utter awareness that it feels like you have been walking through life needing glasses without knowing, and suddenly, when the lenses slide into place, you see everything so much clearer than you ever imagined they could be.

That was one of these moments, when Chris pulled me back around to him, standing so close his face was out of focus and I felt the need to close my eyes. At that moment, I was aware of a thousand little things. Of my feet and my weight on them while they were almost touching Chris' at the toes. Of my rumpled shirt, too big for my skinny body I had begged for years to grow and finally shed its fragility that had made me a target for bullies since first grade. Of a cool night breeze ghosting over my face through the half-open window. Of Chris' hands on my upper arms, holding me carefully as if he was afraid I would run but didn't dare to really hold me fast in case I did want out of this.

I could feel the warmth seeping out of him and into me as I was breathing in part of the same air that had just passed his lips, letting it out only to mix with the air flooding back into him, like an ocean wave trapped between us. Until the space was closed.

It felt like stepping off a cliff and allowing gravity to work its way, like taking the sweet, sweet fall into the bottomless unknown.

_All forces occur in pairs…_ yeah, as a teacher, I would definitely have gotten into trouble for this demonstration of Newton's third law.

1. _An object at rest will remain at rest unless acted upon by an external and unbalanced force. An object in motion will remain in motion unless acted upon by an external and unbalanced force._

2. _The rate of change of momentum of a body is proportional to the resultant force acting on the body and is in the same direction._

3._ All forces occur in pairs, and these two forces are equal in magnitude and opposite in direction._

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